In the thirteenth episode of the fifth season of Supernatural, Anna, desperate to stop Lucifer, takes matter into her own hands. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to watch Supernatural.
It’s a challenging thing for a show to introduce a new plotline that so drastically alters the past. Retcons are tricky because they can threaten the plausibility of a narrative. I don’t think that this show’s use of the whole “angels watching over you” motif was ever planned out to come to this point, but here’s a case of how a retcon – which forces us to re-contextualize past scenes and interactions – adds to the emotional landscape that these characters operate within. It’s haunting, it’s sad, and IT HAS FUCKED ME UP SO MUCH.
Let’s get into it.
Anna’s Mission
I’m inclined to believe Castiel here: I think Anna was somehow convinced while in her heavenly prison to fight for the greater angel authority. She never actually escaped her torment; she was released on purpose. But here’s where I get a little bit confused. I admit that there probably is an endgame here I’m not meant to understand at this point. What bewildered me is rooted in her first appearance in “The Song Remains the Same.” She seeks Dean out in his (absurd) dream, asking him to come meet her. It’s clear that she knew that Dean would jump at the opportunity to help her, but… what was her next move if Castiel hadn’t intercepted her request? If Dean showed up, there is a zero percent chance that she’d be able to convince him to let her kill Sam. So what was her game? Or did she know that Castiel would show up, and the point was that she wanted to try and win Castiel over?
I’m also a bit perplexed as to her reasoning for killing Sam. I thought the angels wanted the Apocalypse to happen. If so, why prevent Dean and Sam from being born? Wouldn’t that completely undo the seals that were broken? Here’s my theory: I think that Anna thought she was solving this issue and was either misinformed or deliberately manipulated into doing this. It was clear to me by the end that Michael wanted Dean and Sam alive, and he wanted to make sure that Anna could never interfere again. As long as it’s not spoilery, I’m okay discussing this. If the answer is coming up? JUST CACKLE AT ME.
Castiel + Sam
CAS SAYS THAT HE CONSIDERS SAM A FRIEND. I JUST LOVE THIS A LOT AND I WISH THERE WAS A BETTER SHIP NAME BECAUSE SAMTIEL IS AWFUL. Wait, SASTIEL. Okay, no, that’s terrible, I give up.
Bucking Expectations
“The Song Remains the Same” covers some familiar ground. This is not the first time that Dean has gotten to meet his parents before he was born, and the idea of returning to the past in order to change the future has also been featured in episodes before. And I think the writers deliberately tease us with this by keeping the first half of this episode within the confines of the familiar. Both of the Winchesters lie about who they are; they make vague references to the truth; and they’re constantly reminded that they cannot change the future. There’s a point during this episode where I actually wondered aloud (very quietly, I should say) how far this show was going to take this concept. Given “What Is and What Should Never Be” and “In The Beginning,” I felt like the story was limited by what we’d already seen.
That’s not to say I was bored or disappointed by what I saw prior to Dean’s confession of his identity to Mary. There is an unbelievable punch in the feelings present in every scene that Sam is in, and Jared’s acting is just incredible here. I’d forgotten that both trips to the past were Dean-centric only. (And yes, one wasn’t really real.) This was the first time Sam was seeing the younger version of his mother and father. AND HE’S IMMEDIATELY STRUCK WITH EMOTIONS AND TEARS AND IT’S ONE OF THE MOST DESTRUCTIVE MOMENTS IN SUPERNATURAL HISTORY. Oh, but then we get Sam telling his own father that he understands him and forgives him and loves him, and John doesn’t even know he’s talking to his son and just ??????????
This show is too much.
And it’s a good thing, make no mistake. I really love what this episode does for the whole show, but all of the emotional shit here is done so well, y’all. It’s fascinating to me how Sam does his best to not reveal his identity, but Dean just gives up. It’s a clear shift in the tone and the direction of “The Song Remains the Same.” Suddenly, Dean doesn’t care about maintaining this fiction anymore. It’s not just because he wants to save his parents. He realizes that there’s a chance here that he could undo the horrific future that leads to the need for this very nightmare. So he tells Mary the truth, and Sam soon joins him so that they can present a united front. If Mary simply leaves John Winchester and never marries him, then neither Winchester son exists, and the angels have no vessels to use. It’s a jarring, shocking decision until you realize that the Winchesters are trying to save the world. Castiel’s lesson in “In the Beginning” doesn’t apply here because the end of the world is real, and it’s going to happen if Dean and Sam don’t do something about it. This is their choice: to erase their entire existence to save the entire planet.
But I had no fucking idea how far the writers would take this premise. I WASN’T READY.
Team Free Will
Supernatural does a fantastic job with parallels. In engaging with Christian theology and Dante’s Divine Comedy and related motifs, we get the whole Dean/Sam and Michael/Lucifer parallel. But “The Song Remains the Same” takes us a step further by introducing a horrifying new element to the Winchester mythology: they are part of the bloodline that traces back to Cain and Abel, and their lives have predestined for thousands of years. And when Michael finally reveals himself (after Anna KILLS SAM oh my god HOW MANY TIMES IS THIS SHOW GOING TO KILL ITS MAIN CHARACTERS just kidding don’t tell me), he doesn’t beat around the bush. He directly confirms that Dean has lived his entire life under the illusion that he has free will. His parents meeting? The yellow-eyed demon? Hell and Lilith and the Colt and Ruby and the apocalypse? Everything was planned. And it’s part of that eternal struggle started long ago when Cain killed Abel, and now, Michael is certain that Dean will fulfill his role and kill his brother while Michael’s brother is in Sam’s body.
This is the first appearance of Michael in the show, and it’s obvious to me that he’s the most powerful angel we’ve ever seen. He kills Anna and sends a much younger Uriel back to heaven, resurrects Sam, erases this entire experience from John and Mary’s mind, and does all of this while casually informing Dean of the illusion of choice. It’s horrifying, and Matthew Cohen does a beautiful job with the role. He had to convey the arrogance and certainty of Michael during the big confrontation scene, and he sold it to me. I know that’s why this was so unsettling to me. Michael does not seem to have any doubt about his plan or Dean’s future. It’s scary! I don’t have any reason to disbelieve what he says!
Which is why I love it so much that Dean and Sam decide that in the aftermath of learning of predestination, they deem themselves Team Free Will. They are going to fight predestination. One ex-blood junkie, a dropout with 6 bucks to his name, and a comatose angel. Y’all, I AM SO EXCITED ABOUT THIS DEVELOPMENT. I cannot wait to see what Supernatural does with this. More Cas, I presume? I’D BE THRILLED WITH THIS.
The video for “The Song Remains the Same” can be downloaded here for $0.99.
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